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Problems

Level 3 Instruction Set Architecture

3. Information Representation
3.1 Unsigned Binary Representation
Binary Storage
Integers
Base Conversions
Range for Unsigned Integers
Unsigned Addition
The Carry Bit
3.2 Two’s Complement Binary Representation
Two’s Complement Range
Base Conversions
The Number Line
The Overflow Bit
The Negative and Zero Bits
3.3 Operations in Binary
Logical Operators
Register Transfer Language
Arithmetic Operators
Rotate Operators
3.4 Hexadecimal and Character Representations
Hexadecimal
Base Conversions
ASCII Characters
Unicode Characters
3.5 Floating-Point Representation
Binary Fractions
Excess Representations
The Hidden Bit
Special Values
The IEEE 754 Floating-Point Standard

8
3.6 Models
Chapter Summary
Exercises
Problems

4. Computer Architecture
4.1 Hardware
Central Processing Unit (CPU)
Main Memory
Input/Output Devices
Data and Control
Instruction Format
4.2 Direct Addressing
The Stop Instruction
The Load Word Instruction
The Store Word Instruction
The Add Instruction
The Subtract Instruction
The And and Or Instructions
The Invert and Negate Instructions
The Load Byte and Store Byte Instructions
The Input and Output Devices
Big Endian Versus Little Endian
4.3 von Neumann Machines
The von Neumann Execution Cycle
A Character Output Program
von Neumann Bugs
A Character Input Program
Converting Decimal to ASCII
A Self-Modifying Program
4.4 Programming at Level ISA3
Read-Only Memory
The Pep/9 Operating System
Using the Pep/9 System
Chapter Summary

9
Exercises
Problems

Level 5 Assembly

5. Assembly Language
5.1 Assemblers
Instruction Mnemonics
Pseudo-Operations
The .ASCII and .END Pseudo-ops
Assemblers
The .BLOCK Pseudo-op
The .WORD and .BYTE Pseudo-ops
Using the Pep/9 Assembler
Cross Assemblers
5.2 Immediate Addressing and the Trap Instructions
Immediate Addressing
The DECI, DECO, and BR Instructions
The STRO Instruction
Interpreting Bit Patterns: The HEXO Instruction
Disassemblers
5.3 Symbols
A Program with Symbols
A von Neumann Illustration
5.4 Translating from Level HOL6
The Printf() Function
Variables and Types
Global Variables and Assignment Statements
Type Compatibility
Pep/9 Symbol Tracer
The Shift and Rotate Instructions
Constants and .EQUATE
Placement of Instructions and Data
Chapter Summary

10
Exercises
Problems

6. Compiling to the Assembly Level

6.1 Stack Addressing and Local Variables
Stack-Relative Addressing
Accessing the Run-Time Stack
Local Variables
6.2 Branching Instructions and Flow of Control
Translating the If Statement
Optimizing Compilers
Translating the If/Else Statement
Translating the While Loop
Translating the Do Loop
Translating the For Loop
Spaghetti Code
Flow of Control in Early Languages
The Structured Programming Theorem
The Goto Controversy
6.3 Function Calls and Parameters
Translating a Function Call
Translating Call-by-Value Parameters with Global Variables
Translating Call-by-Value Parameters with Local Variables
Translating Non-void Function Calls
Translating Call-by-Reference Parameters with Global Variables
Translating Call-by-Reference Parameters with Local Variables
Translating Boolean Types
6.4 Indexed Addressing and Arrays
Translating Global Arrays
Translating Local Arrays
Translating Arrays Passed as Parameters
Translating the Switch Statement
6.5 Dynamic Memory Allocation
Translating Global Pointers
Translating Local Pointers

11
 Translating Structures
Translating Linked Data Structures
Chapter Summary
Exercises
Problems

7. Language Translation Principles

7.1 Languages, Grammars, and Parsing
Concatenation
Languages
Grammars
A Grammar for C Identifiers
A Grammar for Signed Integers
A Context-Sensitive Grammar
The Parsing Problem
A Grammar for Expressions
A C Subset Grammar
Context Sensitivity of C
7.2 Finite-State Machines
An FSM to Parse an Identifier
Simplified FSMs
Nondeterministic FSMs
Machines with Empty Transitions
Multiple Token Recognizers
Grammars Versus FSMs
7.3 Implementing Finite-State Machines
The Compilation Process
A Table-Lookup Parser
A Direct-Code Parser
An Input Buffer Class
A Multiple-Token Parser
7.4 Code Generation
A Language Translator
Parser Characteristics
Chapter Summary

12
Exercises
Problems

Level 4 Operating System

8. Process Management
8.1 Loaders
The Pep/9 Operating System
The Pep/9 Loader
Program Termination
8.2 Traps
The Trap Mechanism
The RETTR Instruction
The Trap Handlers
Trap Addressing Mode Assertion
Trap Operand Address Computation
The No-Operation Trap Handlers
The DECI Trap Handler
The DECO Trap Handler
The HEXO and STRO Trap Handlers and Operating System
Vectors
8.3 Concurrent Processes
Asynchronous Interrupts
Processes in the Operating System
Multiprocessing
A Concurrent Processing Program
Critical Sections
A First Attempt at Mutual Exclusion
A Second Attempt at Mutual Exclusions
Peterson’s Algorithm for Mutual Exclusion
Semaphores
Critical Sections with Semaphores
8.4 Deadlocks
Resource Allocation Graphs

13
 Deadlock Policy
Chapter Summary
Exercises
Problems

9. Storage Management
9.1 Memory Allocation
Uniprogramming
Fixed-Partition Multiprogramming
Logical Addresses
Variable-Partition Multiprogramming
Paging
9.2 Virtual Memory
Large Program Behavior
Virtual Memory
Demand Paging
Page Replacement
Page-Replacement Algorithms
9.3 File Management
Disk Drives
File Abstraction
Allocation Techniques
9.4 Error-Detecting and Error-Correcting Codes
Error-Detecting Codes
Code Requirements
Single-Error-Correcting Codes
9.5 RAID Storage Systems
RAID Level 0: Nonredundant Striped
RAID Level 1: Mirrored
RAID Levels 01 and 10: Striped and Mirrored
RAID Level 2: Memory-Style ECC
RAID Level 3: Bit-Interleaved Parity
RAID Level 4: Block-Interleaved Parity
RAID Level 5: Block-Interleaved Distributed Parity
Chapter Summary

14
Exercises

Level 1 Logic Gate

10. Combinational Circuits

10.1 Boolean Algebra and Logic Gates
Combinational Circuits
Truth Tables
Boolean Algebra
Boolean Algebra Theorems
Proving Complements
Logic Diagrams
Alternate Representations
10.2 Combinational Analysis
Boolean Expressions and Logic Diagrams
Truth Tables and Boolean Expressions
Two-Level Circuits
The Ubiquitous NAND
10.3 Combinational Design
Canonical Expressions
Three-Variable Karnaugh Maps
Four-Variable Karnaugh Maps
Dual Karnaugh Maps
Don’t-Care Conditions
10.4 Combinational Devices
Viewpoints
Multiplexer
Binary Decoder
Demultiplexer
Adder
Adder/Subtracter
Arithmetic Logic Unit
Abstraction at Level LG1
Chapter Summary

15
Exercises

11. Sequential Circuits

11.1 Latches and Clocked Flip-Flops
The SR Latch
The Clocked SR Flip-Flop
The Master–Slave SR Flip-Flop
The Basic Flip-Flops
The JK Flip-Flop
The D Flip-Flop
The T Flip-Flop
Excitation Tables
11.2 Sequential Analysis and Design
A Sequential Analysis Problem
Preset and Clear
Sequential Design
A Sequential Design Problem
11.3 Computer Subsystems
Registers
Buses
Memory Subsystems
Address Decoding
A Two-Port Register Bank
Chapter Summary
Exercises

Level 2 Microcode

12. Computer Organization

12.1 Constructing a Level-ISA3 Machine
The CPU Data Section
The von Neumann Cycle
The Store Byte Direct Instruction
Bus Protocols

16
 The Store Word Direct Instruction
The Add Immediate Instruction
The Load Word Indirect Instruction
The Arithmetic Shift Right Instruction
The CPU Control Section
12.2 Performance
The Data Bus Width and Memory Alignment
Memory Alignment
The Definition of an n-Bit Computer
Cache Memories
The System Performance Equation
RISC Versus CISC
12.3 The MIPS Machine
The Register Set
The Addressing Modes
The Instruction Set
MIPS Computer Organization
Pipelining
12.4 Conclusion
Simplifications in the Model
The Big Picture
Chapter Summary
Exercises
Problems

Appendix
Solutions to Selected Exercises
Index

17
Preface
The fifth edition of Computer Systems offers a clear, detailed, step-by-step
exposition of the central ideas in computer organization, assembly
language, and computer architecture. The book is based in large part on a
virtual computer, Pep/9, which is designed to teach the basic concepts of
the classic von Neumann machine. The strength of this approach is that the
central concepts of computer science are taught without getting entangled
in the many irrelevant details that often accompany such courses. This
approach also provides a foundation that encourages students to think
about the underlying themes of computer science. Breadth is achieved by
emphasizing computer science topics that are related to, but not usually
included in, the treatment of hardware and its associated software.

Summary of Contents
Computers operate at several levels of abstraction; programming at a high
level of abstraction is only part of the story. This book presents a unified
concept of computer systems based on the level structure of FIGURE
P.1 .
The book is divided into seven parts, corresponding to the seven levels
of Figure P.1:

Level App7 Applications

Level HOL6 High-order languages
Level ISA3 Instruction set architecture
Level Asmb5 Assembly
Level OS4 Operating system
Level LG1 Logic gate
Level Mc2 Microcode

18
The text generally presents the levels top-down, from the highest to the
lowest. Level ISA3 is discussed before Level Asmb5, and Level LG1 is
discussed before Level Mc2 for pedagogical reasons. In these two
instances, it is more natural to revert temporarily to a bottom-up approach
so that the building blocks of the lower level will be in hand for
construction of the higher level.

Level App7
Level App7 is a single chapter on application programs. It presents the
idea of levels of abstraction and binary information and establishes the
framework for the remainder of the book. A few concepts of relational
databases are presented as an example of a typical computer application.

Level HOL6

19
Level HOL6 consists of one chapter, which reviews the C programming
language. The chapter assumes that the student has experience in some
imperative language, such as Java or Python—not necessarily C. The
instructor can readily translate the C examples to other common Level
HOL6 languages if necessary.
This chapter emphasizes the C memory model, including global versus
local variables, functions with parameters, and dynamically allocated
variables. The topic of recursion is treated because it depends on the
mechanism of memory allocation on the run-time stack. A fairly detailed
explanation is given on the details of the memory allocation process for
function calls, as this mechanism is revisited at a lower level of abstraction
later in the book.

Level ISA3
Level ISA3 is the instruction set architecture level. Its two chapters
describe Pep/9, a virtual computer designed to illustrate computer
concepts. Pep/9 is a small complex instruction set computer (CISC); a von
Neumann machine. The central processing unit (CPU) contains an
accumulator, an index register, a program counter, a stack pointer, and an
instruction register. It has eight addressing modes: immediate, direct,
indirect, stack-relative, stack-relative deferred, indexed, stack-indexed, and
stack-deferred indexed. The Pep/9 operating system, in simulated read-
only memory (ROM), can load and execute programs in hexadecimal
format from students’ text files. Students run short programs on the Pep/9
simulator and learn that executing a store instruction to ROM does not
change the memory value.
Students learn the fundamentals of information representation and
computer organization at the bit level. Because a central theme of this
book is the relationship of the levels to one another, the Pep/9 chapters
show the relationship between the ASCII representation (Level ISA3) and
C variables of type char (Level HOL6). They also show the relationship
between two’s complement representation (Level ISA3) and C variables of
type int (Level HOL6).

Level Asmb5
Level Asmb5 is the assembly level. The text presents the concept of the
assembler as a translator between two levels—assembly and machine. It
introduces Level Asmb5 symbols and the symbol table.
The unified approach really comes into play here. Chapters 5 and 6
present the compiler as a translator from a high-order language to

20
assembly language. Previously, students learned a specific Level HOL6
language, C, and a specific von Neumann machine, Pep/9. These chapters
continue the theme of relationships between the levels by showing the
correspondence between (a) assignment statements at Level HOL6 and
load/store instructions at Level Asmb5, (b) loops and if statements at Level
HOL6 and branching instructions at Level Asmb5, (c) arrays at Level
HOL6 and indexed addressing at Level Asmb5, (d) procedure calls at
Level HOL6 and the run-time stack at Level Asmb5, (e) function and
procedure parameters at Level HOL6 and stack-relative addressing at
Level Asmb5, (f) switch statements at Level HOL6 and jump tables at
Level Asmb5, and (g) pointers at Level HOL6 and addresses at Level
Asmb5.
The beauty of the unified approach is that the text can implement the
examples from the C chapter at this lower level. For example, the run-time
stack illustrated in the recursive examples of Chapter 2 corresponds
directly to the hardware stack in Pep/9 main memory. Students gain an
understanding of the compilation process by translating manually between
the two levels.
This approach provides a natural setting for the discussion of central
issues in computer science. For example, the book presents structured
programming at Level HOL6 versus the possibility of unstructured
programming at Level Asmb5. It discusses the goto controversy and the
structured programming/efficiency tradeoff, giving concrete examples
from languages at the two levels.
Chapter 7, “Language Translation Principles,” introduces students to
computer science theory. Now that students know intuitively how to
translate from a high-level language to assembly language, we pose the
fundamental question underlying all of computing: What can be
automated? The theory naturally fits in here because students now know
what a compiler (an automated translator) must do. They learn about
parsing and finite-state machines—deterministic and nondeterministic—in
the context of recognizing C and Pep/9 assembly language tokens. This
chapter includes an automatic translator between two small languages,
which illustrates lexical analysis, parsing, and code generation. The lexical
analyzer is an implementation of a finite-state machine. What could be a
more natural setting for the theory?

Level OS4
Level OS4 consists of two chapters on operating systems. Chapter 8 is a
description of process management. Two sections, one on loaders and

21
another on trap handlers, illustrate the concepts with the Pep/9 operating
system. Seven instructions have unimplemented opcodes that generate
software traps. The operating system stores the process control block of
the user’s running process on the system stack, and the interrupt service
routine interprets the instruction. The classic state transition diagram for
running and waiting processes in an operating system is thus reinforced
with a specific implementation of a suspended process. The chapter
concludes with a description of concurrent processes and deadlocks.
Chapter 9 describes storage management, both main memory and disk
memory.

Level LG1
Level LG1 uses two chapters to present combinational and sequential
circuits. Chapter 10 emphasizes the importance of the mathematical
foundation of computer science by starting with the axioms of Boolean
algebra. It shows the relationship between Boolean algebra and logic gates
and then describes some common logic devices, including a complete
logic design of the Pep/9 arithmetic logic unit (ALU). Chapter 11
illustrates the fundamental concept of a finite-state machine through the
state transition diagrams of sequential circuits. It concludes with a
description of common computer subsystems such as bidirectional buses,
memory chips, and two-port memory banks.

Level Mc2
Chapter 12 describes the microprogrammed control section of the Pep/9
CPU. It gives the control sequences for a few sample instructions and
addressing modes and provides a large set of exercises for the others. It
also presents concepts of load/store architectures, contrasting the MIPS
reduced instruction set computer (RISC) machine with the Pep/9 CISC
machine. It concludes with performance issues by describing cache
memories, pipelining, dynamic branch prediction, and superscalar
machines.

Use in a Course
This book offers such broad coverage that instructors may wish to omit
some of the material when designing a course. I use Chapters 1–7 in a
computer systems course and Chapters 10–12 in a computer organization
course.
In the book, Chapters 1–5 must be covered sequentially. Chapters 6

22
(“Compiling to the Assembly Level”) and 7 (“Language Translation
Principles”) can be covered in either order. I often skip ahead to Chapter 7
to initiate a large software project, writing an assembler for a subset of
Pep/9 assembly language, so students will have sufficient time to complete
it during the semester. Chapter 11 (“Sequential Circuits”) is obviously
dependent on Chapter 10 (“Combinational Circuits”), but neither depends
on Chapter 9 (“Storage Management”), which may be omitted. FIGURE
P.2 , a chapter dependency graph, summarizes the possible chapter
omissions.

Changes Made for the Fifth Edition

Improvements are in every chapter of this edition, and fall into one of two
categories: a change in the virtual machine from Pep/8 to Pep/9 and other
changes in content. The changes in content are too numerous to list, but
major changes include the following:

› HOL6 language—This edition changes the HOL6 language from C++

to C. The C language is more common as a systems programming
language and is more appropriate for a computer systems text. The
previous edition refers to the memory model of C++ consisting of
global variables allocated at a fixed location in memory, local
variables and parameters allocated on the run-time stack, and dynamic
variables allocated from the heap. But C++ is an OO language with a
more complex memory model. The above model more accurately
describes C than C++. The switch is visible in three places.
Input/output (I/O) in the example programs use scanf() and printf()
instead of cin and cout. The pass-by reference mechanism in C has the
address operator & explicit in the actual parameter with a
corresponding pointer type in the formal parameter. Memory

23
 allocation from the heap uses malloc instead of new.
› Sidebars—In this edition, the brief biographies formerly found in each
chapter have been replaced with a different set of sidebars. Each
sidebar is a real-world example of the concepts described in that
chapter. As most of the chapters describe the Pep/9 virtual machine,
the sidebars for those chapters show some corresponding
implementations for the Intel x86 architecture. The new sidebars give
a consistent running example of this architecture so students have a
better idea of how the concepts of the virtual machine relate to real-
world implementations.
› New and expanded topics—Chapter 1 now emphasizes how binary
information is quantified in both space and time by presenting the
performance equation and the concept of bandwidth. QR codes and
color displays are detailed examples of these concepts. Chapter 3
describes Unicode as well as UTF-32 and UTF-8 encoding. Chapter 4
discusses big-endian and little-endian order. Chapter 7 uses Java
instead of C++ as the implementation language for the example
translator. The microcode examples in Chapter 12 use the new
UnitPre and UnitPost feature of the Pep/9 CPU simulator. The two-
byte data bus now has simulator support, and that topic leads to an
extended discussion of memory alignment issues and the new .ALIGN
assembler directive.
Pep/8, the virtual machine for the two previous editions, has been
superseded by Pep/9. As the instruction sets of the two machines are
different, Pep/8 source and object programs are not compatible with those
of Pep/9. Only a few instructions are affected, however, so much remains
the same, including the set of eight addressing modes. The changes for
Pep/9 include the following:

› Replacement of RETn with RET—In Pep/8, there are eight versions of

the return statement, RET0, RET1, . . ., RET7. RETn deallocates n bytes
from the run-time stack and then executes a return from a function
call. The reasoning is that returns are always preceded by a
deallocation of local variables, so programs are shorter if the assembly
language programmer is not required to write an ADDSP instruction to
explicitly deallocate the locals before the return.
While this ISA design may be justified on architectural principles, it
turned out to be deficient pedagogically. The problem is that students
must learn two different concepts: the deallocation mechanism for

24
 data and the return mechanism for flow of control. Combining these
two different concepts into one statement can be confusing during the
learning process. Pep/9 now requires students to explicitly deallocate
locals with the ADDSP statement. An added stylistic advantage is that
the explicit ADDSP to deallocate locals at the end of a function
corresponds directly to the SUBSP at the beginning of the function to
allocate locals.
› Memory-mapped I/O—Of all the instructions in the Pep/8 instruction
set, the most unrealistic are CHARI and CHARO for character input
and output. Most real computer systems map input and output devices
to main memory, which is now the design of Pep/9. In the new
instruction set, there are no native input and output instructions.
Instead, the Pep/8 instruction
CHARI alpha,ad

is replaced by the Pep/9 instructions

LDBA charIn,d ;Load byte to A from charIn
STBA alpha,ad ;Store byte from A to alpha

where charIn is the input device. The Pep/8 instruction

CHARO beta,ad

is replaced by the Pep/9 instructions

LDBA beta,ad ;Load byte to A from beta
STBA charOut,d ;Store byte to charOut

where charOut is the output device.

In the above code fragments, ad represents any valid addressing mode
for the instruction. Symbols charIn and charOut are defined in the Pep/9
operating system and stored as machine vectors at the bottom of
memory. Their values are included automatically in the symbol table
of the assembler.
One disadvantage of memory-mapped I/O is that every CHARI and
CHARO statement in a Pep/8 program must now be written as two
statements, making programs longer. This disadvantage is mitigated
by the fact that the trap instructions DECI, DECO, and STRO work as
before, as the native I/O statements are hidden inside their trap
routines.
The advantage is that students learn firsthand how memory-mapped

25
Discovering Diverse Content Through
Random Scribd Documents
 We delight in the band evenings, when we sit and watch the
groups of natives walking about under the pretty trees; the fat
mothers with coveys of slim, dark-haired daughters in fresh muslin
frocks; the young Filipino “mashers” in white suits with straw hats
worn daringly on one side, and long, thin, tight boots, trying to hide
their shyness by a lot of swagger with a walking-stick; and all the
little comedies and flirtations that go on. I have hardly ever seen any
white people there except ourselves; a newly-married American
couple who sit in the dark shadows very close together, and some
American soldiers in khaki and turned-up sombreros. The
programmes always end with “The Star-Spangled Banner,” on which
we stand up and C—— takes his hat off, but the American soldiers
unfortunately seldom trouble to salute their Anthem—and as to the
Filipinos, they remain truculently seated with their hats on. It makes
one feel rather foolish to be the only ones to take any notice, but C
—— insists.
We have now entered into possession of our trap and pony, and
have had some blissful drives along the eternal roads to Jaro and
Molo, out in the sunset and back in the starlight or moonlight,
skimming along on rubber tyres. Tracks that we used to tear down
when anyone lent us a carriage are now rigorously tabooed!
Everyone here drives top-speed, and the Filipinos all crawl about the
roads, and never dream of getting out of the way unless one shouts
out a native word—“Tabé!”—when they just move enough to avoid
instant death like a clever matador in a bull-fight. The curious thing
is we have more trouble with the natives who are walking towards
us instead of those going the same way. That may sound strange to
you, and even incredible, but if you knew the Philippines and the
Filipinos you would understand that it could not be otherwise. This
element is very exciting, and makes an ordinary evening-drive to
Molo rather better than a trip on a fire-engine in Piccadilly.
I quite forgot to tell you that some time ago an unknown man was
announced and walked into the sala, in the evening, just before C
—— came home. This person was an American, of about thirty, with
rather a good-looking face and the usual thick, long hair parted in
the middle. He bowed and said:
“Mis’ Darncey, I guess?”
I said Mrs Dauncey was my name.
“Is your husband to home?”
I said he was not, and began to get alarmed, for I thought the
man had come to tell me of some accident to C——; but he soon
reassured me by telling me he guessed I could tell him what he
wanted to know, which was whether we had a spare room, as he
was looking for a family for himself and his wife to board with.
I nearly fell down flat with amazement, but I managed, I hope,
not to show my surprise, for I remembered that the Americans live
out here in “messes,” often several families together, and I reflected
that this touting must be some curious custom of which I had not
heard. So I said, quite politely, that I was very sorry, but I was afraid
this house was only large enough for ourselves.
“Oh,” he said, with a great deal of bowing, but no intention of
going away, “I heard this was a big house and reckoned you didn’t
fill it.”
“We have a room empty,” I said, “in fact we have two, but I am
afraid my husband would never hear of such a thing as anyone we
did not know, or any friend, either, coming to live with us.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” he said. “My wife is in a quilez downstairs,
and I can fetch her up to see you and look at the rooms.”
At this fresh and astounding announcement, I gasped. But I kept
my temper, and replied that I thought he need not disturb his wife,
for we had really no intention of taking anyone to live in our house;
but the man would not be convinced, and argued the point, saying
that he had been to six other people, and he was “fair tired of going
around.”
 I was wondering how to get rid of him, for he was so remarkably
oily and polite, and kept on saying ma’am every two words. But just
then C—— came home, and when the visitor introduced himself,
with explanations of his mission, C—— flushed up, and I began to be
afraid he would kick the man out. But luckily the American was quick
enough to see there was no mistaking the few words C—— said, nor
the manner in which he said them in, and he bowed himself out in a
about two seconds.
A strange story? But stranger still is the fact that this was not a
common man—I mean his position was not what we call common—
as C—— has found out that he is an official high up in the Customs
service, and lately married to a schoolma’am. And stranger still is the
fact that the Americans to whom I have told this story can see
nothing odd in it at all.
I can’t suppose that such peculiar customs really prevail in the
United States, and that if C—— were to call on the President’s wife,
as they are all equals, and leave me in a cab below while he asked
her if she took in boarders, that he would not get into trouble. Fancy
if this man made a big fortune out here, and we called on him in his
mansion in New York and insisted on taking rooms in it—the idea is
preposterous—but why?
After this person had departed, we soothed our excited nerves by
sitting on the balcony and watching one of the eternally beautiful
sunsets. I will describe it to you, for it is very much the same every
evening, with varying shades of intensity. The sky behind the palms
in the distance was deep orange, fading into rose, and overhead into
apple-green blue. We went through the house and out on to the
Azotea, and all the sky on that side was like a radiant, pale
amethyst, with a big bright moon rising—a great silver shield—
through the lilac and rosy mist; the water a deep sapphire blue; and
Guimaras a brilliant green outline dividing the sea and sky. The tide
was in, and the water came up to the wall at the end of the garden,
where a sheep was nibbling grass at the end of its tether, perfectly
indifferent to a fool of a puppy, which ran backwards and forwards
barking at its heels. In the empty stables on each side of our own is
a regular camp of poor people, who were lounging by the well,
watching one or two naked brown babies playing on the ground.
They all looked so peaceful and happy and so picturesque in the
sunset and moonlight, that we agreed with each other that perhaps
life in the Philippines might be quite pleasant if one only lived the
right way and had a brown skin covered by a minimum of clothes.
They are a singularly happy people, these Filipinos, when they are
unspoilt by the advantages of civilisation. One never sees or hears
people quarrelling, and they are so kind to their children—always
laughing and chattering and showing their fine white teeth, so that
to watch a group of poor people is always a pleasure. We have been
amused for a long time by the spectacle of a house that is being
built in the suburbs, a stately go-as-you-please undertaking that is
being gone through in an amusingly characteristic manner. They
begin a house by constructing the roof, all lashed with bejuco, and
very neatly put together, which sits on the ground an indefinite time.
Then the arigis—the posts of bamboo or hard wood—are put in
position, and a floor is made about 15 or 20 feet from the earth. Our
friends on the Molo road got so far, and then started to live in the bit
that was finished, camping in a sort of tent on the split-cane floor,
with the roof lying alongside on the ground. I daresay they were
“out” of nipa thatch, and did not dare to trust the building out of
their sight, for the town-dwelling Filipinos are shocking thieves and
burglars. Whatever their reason was, there they lived for quite a
long time, till at last we were quite relieved to see them begin to put
thatch on the framework. Then, one day when we passed we saw
that the roof had also been thatched and hoisted into place, though
how this latter feat was brought about I don’t know, as we
unfortunately missed that part of the operations; but I have been
told that, when the roof has been thatched, it is raised and put in
position by sheer human force and much advice and swearing.
 LETTER XXIII.
A TROPICAL SHOWER—OUR SERVANTS—
FILIPINO CUSTOMS

Iloilo, April 27, 1905.

Nothing from you by the mail to-day. The forwarding from Manila
seems to be so unsatisfactory that we think you had better begin
sending letters straight to this place. The address for the future,
therefore, will be to us to—P.O. Box 140, Iloilo. You have to put this,
as there is no delivery of letters—a most strange and tiresome
system. In the outside wall of the post-office is a recess with a
number of pigeon holes, some glazed, some shut with a flap, each
with its own lock and key, of which the owner keeps a duplicate. On
the wall outside is a blackboard where the arrivals and departures of
mails are chalked up, and when you see a mail has come in, you go
off and do a sort of “bran-pie” dip in your pigeon hole to see what
you get out.
To-day we have had a very heavy thunderstorm, which has filled
the tanks and cooled the air, the thermometer having gone down
from 90° to 82°. The rain came on just as I was dressing after my
siesta, so I hurried on a dressing-gown and went out on to the
Azotea to see about the pipe, as it was no good blowing my whistle
for a servant in the noise of the storm and the terrific din of the rain
upon the iron roofs.
I found Sotero having a glorious time with a petroleum can, which
people use here for all water-carrying, like we used to see them do
in Palestine. This can was fixed to a line, and the muchacho was
risking his neck to let it down so as to intercept the overflow of a
roof gutter belonging to the people below, and filling every tin, jug,
and bath the house possessed, all spread out on the Azotea; giving
the concrete floor of the Azotea itself a liberal wash-down at the
same time. He was hopping about the balcony, face beaming and
clothes dripping wet, and I laughed as I thought of the conventional
idea of an English butler! He is a very good butler, all the same, or
has learnt to be one, for when he came to us he did not know how
to lay a table; while now, if we give a dinner, he insists on arranging
everything himself, and does it perfectly, even to folding the
serviettes in fancy shapes, which he has got some other servant to
teach him.
All round I hear stories of the miseries and terrors people go
through with their Filipino servants, and “the inevitable muchacho” is
a standing joke in the American papers. But our retainers just jog
along in perfect peace, always in the house, always clean and tidy;
and as to their work, not only not shirking it, but improving every
day, and always ready and willing to give any help in the stables, or
anything they can think of. I agree with my friends that we have
been very lucky in finding such excellent “boys,” but I must take a
little credit to myself too, for having treated them with the utmost
consideration and politeness, showing them things patiently over
and over again, and never once speaking sharply or angrily. I am
sure they appreciate such treatment instead of the way in which I
see people scolding and cursing their muchachos, and that our
having such good and trustworthy servants is not entirely due to
random luck in choosing them.
Now the rain has come. We shall have mosquitoes again—they
had almost disappeared in this long drought, but an hour or two
after a shower the place is humming with them again.
Yesterday was Palm Sunday, on account of which a procession was
going about of all sorts of people carrying palm branches, headed by
a banda de musica playing “Hiawatha,” and in the midst a large cart
covered with coloured paper, bearing an image of some sort; all very
tawdry and crude, and not in the least picturesque.
In the evening, when we drove into Jaro, we saw some Negritos
from the mountains inland—the aborigines who sometimes come
down into the towns on such occasions of Fiesta to do a little
trading, and beg and pick up what they can. These people are very
small, much smaller even than the Filipinos, who are so little; and
they have quite black skins, irregular faces of real nigger type, with
big heads of fuzzy black hair, like Bescharins. They were all very dirty
and ragged, and looked very skinny and miserable beside the plump
Malay town’s-people, and those we saw were begging from door to
door, and from everyone they met, poor souls.
Sometimes in the Filipino race a child is born with curly locks
instead of the usual black, straight, Chinese-looking hair, and this
curliness is considered a great beauty, and tremendously admired;
which is very strange, as, of course, such a trait is only a reversion
to some strain of the despised Negrito; but the Filipinos are far too
stupid to know that. In fact, if the hair is so curly as to be positively
woolly, they are more pleased than ever.
On Fiesta days, too, certain beggars appear, sitting by the roads
displaying horrible deformities, and praying away at an amazing
rate, sometimes with a child to run out and beg for them. It is a
simple, unsophisticated idea, that of having your begging done for
you, but I don’t know that the custom is confined to Filipinos.
A day or two ago an American described to me an incident of
Filipino life, which I thought very characteristic of this people. She
told me that after she first came here, she was sitting in the house
one day, when she heard a band coming along the street playing a
rattling two-step march, so she rushed to the window and pushed
the shutter aside to see the fun, which turned out to be a funeral,
with a pale blue coffin, decorated with garlands in carved wood
painted pink.
I asked her if she thought the people imagined the occasion to be
a festive one; but she said no, that they simply did not know one
sort of tune from another, she thought, for they were walking along
in the most approved mourning style, and as to the coffin, it was
only the Filipino idea of taste. It is curious to think what a very thin
veneer of our civilisation these people have acquired, and how they
would shed it all as easily as my little lizard has cast off his old coat;
and would probably, as he does, feel infinitely lighter and jollier in
the primitive covering underneath.
 LETTER XXIV.
EASTER FESTIVITIES

Iloilo, April 24, 1905.

This is Easter Monday, and since Thursday the town has been
crammed full of people—natives—and alive with processions. We got
a double allowance of the latter, as the Aglipayanos turned out in full
force—fuller force, in fact, than the Orthodox, and their marching
and counter-marching was most interesting, even if a little
confusing.
We are having holidays, of course, but a holiday here is never very
complete, as the different religions go their own way, and now, for
instance, the Chinese shops are all open; but the Spanish and
Mestizo establishments are shut, while the Englishmen have all gone
away, except a few juniors left in charge. One party has gone
shooting, and they were very anxious for C—— to accompany them,
but he did not like to leave me alone here, and refused. There is
plenty of good shooting—wild duck, snipe, etc.—but some way
inland, and the difficulty is to get there, when you are a busy man,
with only forty-eight hours to spare at rare intervals.
À propos of shooting, C—— has only now got his gun back from
the Customs! It was detained by endless dilatoriness and delays, and
the finding of the sureties, which I described to you. There was
more trouble and fuss and worry about that gun and my little
revolver than you, who have not been in this country, would believe.
Such a lot of signing of papers, taking of oaths, and so forth! all of
which precautions seem remarkable and rather superfluous in a
“perfectly peaceful and contented country.”
Well, C—— tried to console himself for not going shooting by
playing lawn-tennis at the Bank, where a very good court has been
marked out in a field at the back of the house, by the estuary. That
gives you a little hint of the climate, does it not? A grass lawn-tennis
court in the hot season?
We walked to the Bank and back, as the pony had gone to be
shod, and on our way home we were stopped in the Plaza by crowds
of people evidently waiting for a procession to pass. We got across
the road as best we could, and up into the garden in the middle of
the Plaza, where we managed to get a foothold amongst a line of
people—all natives of the poorer classes—standing on the low wall.
Just as we got there the procession began to come past—a long
double file of women in black skirts and black or white camisas; the
men in mourning, which is an ordinary swallow-tail evening suit. This
was Good Friday, and the Emblems of the Passion were borne aloft,
draped in black, while the Madonna, carried shoulder-high on a big
platform, had on a stiff, black robe; and the whole company was
moving slowly along to a guitar and mandoline banda de musica,
with big crape bows on their instruments, playing slow tunes in
minor keys.
What do you think this procession was?—Christ’s Funeral! The
whole parade was a real funeral procession, and the last thing of all,
preceded by acolytes in black, swinging censers with large crape
bows on them, and followed by priests in black vestments saying
(not chanting) prayers, was a huge black and gold catafalque—the
coffin made with glass panels—through which could be seen a wax
figure of the dead Christ lying swathed in an embroidered white
satin winding-sheet, with a last touch of realism in His head, bound
with a blood-stained handkerchief where the Crown of Thorns had
rested.
We waited long on the wall of the Alameda while this weird and
gruesome procession trailed past, dwindling away down a long,
straight street to the right, with its files of bowed figures and its
great, black, swaying catafalque.
When we turned to come away, C—— drew my attention to the
curious fact that the Cathedral door was shut—a most extraordinary
spectacle—which struck me as peculiar at once. At first we could not
understand the reason, and thought it must be part of the solemnity.
“Perhaps,” I said, “they go so far as to take the procession to a
cemetery.”
“I know!” said C——. “They’ve shut the doors because these
fellows are the Aglipayanos!”
Then it also occurred to us that of course this procession had had
the native music, whereas the Orthodox go about to the strains of a
brass Constabulary band to show that they are all right with the
Government. I must tell you, too, that on these, and all occasions,
fights are so frequent between these sects of the followers of Christ
that the processions go about with a strong escort of police.
As the tail end of the procession passed, we looked up our street
from our vantage point on the wall, and C—— said: “What a pity we
are not on our own balcony, as they have made a round, and are
coming past the house.”
But I thought they could not have had time to do that, slow as
they had been, and was sure that what we saw must be the head of
the procession passing the other side of the square. It was quite
dark by now, and all the mourners carried lighted tapers. The crowd
in the square and the procession all seemed hopelessly mixed, but
when we at last made our way to the end of our own street, we
found that we were both right about the Funeral, for there were two
of them—the tail of the Aglipayanos was passing the end of our
street, while away up, beyond our house, the road was blocked by
the Romanists waiting to let the others go past.
We tried to get up our street, but the R.C. procession had started
to come down it, so we took refuge on a flight of stairs through an
open doorway. We had a very good view of this Funeral too.
It was just the same style of thing, only with more Spaniards and
Eurasians amongst the mourners; and, following the bier of the
Christ, a dozen or so of converted Chinamen with their pigtails
lopped off. In this procession, too, the priests were white men, but
on the other hand, the Aglipayano padres are all Filipinos, only we
had not been near enough to the first procession to see their faces,
which would have shown us at once which sort they were.
The Papists had their drums and trumpets tied with huge black
bows, and their catafalque was a still more gloomy erection, set
round with large oil lamps in frosted globes, and topped by great
bunches of nodding black plumes, like the old prints of the funeral of
Wellington.
About midnight we were awakened by the sound of a slow,
muffled band and feet shuffling along the road, so we went out on
to the balcony, and saw the R.C. procession go trailing past, very
solemn and uncanny in the moonlight, with their yellow taper-flames
looking like little bits of gold paper in the strong white light. This
time they had not the great catafalque with them, which, we
imagined, must signify that the Christ was at rest in the tomb.
Next morning, Saturday, things were very quiet, and the town
much as usual, except for the crowds of people everywhere, all
crawling up and down the streets in very clean clothes, with
innumerable tiny children.
Easter Sunday was very gay, beginning with deafening bells well in
the dark hours of the morning, when even the cocks had hardly
begun to tune up for the day. The great excitement was a children’s
carnival (at the end of Lent!), got up by the Spanish Club; which
event resolved itself into the inevitable procession through the
streets, for these people are as inveterate procession-walkers as the
Swiss; and whatever comes off, they turn out and walk about the
streets, quite conceited and perfectly happy, taking the whole
mummery with invulnerable seriousness.
These children were really a very pretty sight, though, and the
little things seemed to be enjoying themselves immensely. At about
four o’clock they began to assemble, forming up and marching round
the Plaza, and then up the Calle Real to the Gobierno (the
Government buildings), round the grass plot in front of that building,
back and down the street parallel to this, and finally along here,
when we saw them from our balcony.
One of the prettiest cars was got up as the Sea, with clouds of
pale green and blue tulle, the back of the car a great fan-shaped
shell, in which sat a very pretty little Mestiza girl dressed as a
mermaid, with a long pasteboard tail, and driving two swans.
Another was “the world”—a huge globe with the four continents
sitting one at each corner; another was a monster basket full of a
miscellaneous collection of ballet-fairies, toreadors, Faust and
Mephistopheles, gipsies, and so forth, all very solemn and perfectly
happy. One tiny person of two years old was dressed as a cupid in
pink muslin and roses—such a darling—and one little girl was a
funny wee clown, as broad as she was long.
After they had all gone past, we went to the Spanish Club to see
the prize-giving, which was very amusing. “Iloilo at a glance” was
squeezing and surging about in the big room upstairs, and I thought
the floor must cave in; but Mr M——, who is a member of that club,
told me it was all right, as they always put props under the floor for
a funcion, a characteristically Spanish and haphazard idea.
There was a band playing somewhere, and in an alcove a big tea-
table spread out, while the whole of one wall was lined with long
tables displaying the prizes—really lovely toys.
We walked about, talking to the children, all very keen to show off
and explain their costumes, and the mermaid immensely proud of
the little wheel on which her tail moved along the floor. One
miniature couple in evening dress, looking like grown-up people seen
through the wrong end of a telescope, were well worth watching
and following about, for neither of them would have sacrificed his or
her dignity to a smile for anything in the world.
The prize-giving went by vote, but the poor mites who had not got
prizes were consoled by toys doled out in a novel and pretty fashion
at the end of the show. I fancy I have seen it somewhere in a
cotillon, but can’t be sure. From the ceiling hung two huge Japanese
umbrellas, with coloured ribbons dangling from each spoke, and
when they were lowered at the end, the children filed past
underneath, each taking off a ribbon and tearing away to see what
present it was good for. We saw the little man, of the couple in
evening dress, going about showing off his prize—the first prize, I
think it was—which was a beautiful doll. Then, to our astonishment,
we found that the couple were a pair of little sisters, Filipinas, of
course, for there were, none but Filipino, Spanish, and Mestizo
children taking part in the fête, though all the American Colony, as
they call themselves, were in the room. I think there are very few
American children here, and those that there are look miserably
white, and thinner even than the Spanish or Mestizo youngsters.
We left about seven, before the rush, as we had the trap waiting
outside, and the last thing we saw was the mermaid showing
somebody her tail and the poor clown crying sleepily on her mother’s
shoulder.
In the evening there was a baile, which we summoned up energy
to turn out for, but it was hardly worth the effort, as the floor had
been spoilt by boots in the afternoon, while the band, half asleep,
poor creatures, played intolerably slow and mournful music, to which
the dancers crawled languidly about, for it was a very hot night,
without a breath of air anywhere.
 LETTER XXV.
A DAY AT NAGABA

Iloilo, April 30, 1905.

We went last Sunday to spend the day at Nagaba, a native village
opposite Iloilo, in the island of Guimaras. We took the trip at the
invitation of some friends who had gone to spend Saturday to
Monday in a native house which happened to be empty and available
for hire. I have often wanted to visit some of the places about, but
the great difficulty is how to put up, for there are no inns, and no
lodgings to be had in the villages. One can’t go anywhere and back
in a day, unless just across to Guimaras, but even that entails going
out in the heat of the day, which is never very pleasant or very safe.
We were lucky, however, in this trip to Nagaba, as the sky was
cloudy and the breeze very fresh, and, though we left as late as ten
in the morning, we did not suffer from the heat. I am constantly
reminded of a certain book of adventure, which as children we used
to love, called The Coral Island. It is by Ballantyne, I think—you
remember it, I am sure? Do you remember the pictures of the three
boys in the Tropic Island, standing in white sunshine, and wearing
loose caps or no hats at all? and all the stories of their adventures,
and how they set off at “about the middle of the day” in a canoe
with sufficient meat and vegetables to last for a week, and how they
went in this fashion to other small islands? This did not seem to me
odd as a child, of course; and I daresay I saw nothing peculiar in the
daily life of The Swiss Family Robinson, either; and probably should
have raised no objections to any of these stories a few months ago,
or minded a bit being told that English boys went about unscorched
and alive with no protection from the tropic mid-day sun, or that
meat was fit to eat after one day in a canoe, much less one week!
 Well, we got over to Guimaras in a very short time, landing from
the launch in a small boat, from which C—— and I and the friend
who was with us were carried ashore by our servants, who had
come with us—we had also, by request, brought our plates, knives,
forks, and tumblers!
The house we were going to was situated on a small rocky steep
leading up from the beach, a few hundred yards from a tiny village
of brown nipa huts amongst the green bushes and palms in a bay at
the mouth of a river. The house was a regular native dwelling, built
on high poles of bamboo, with walls of nipa, and floors of pieces of
split cane half an inch or so apart for coolness. The whole abode
consisted of one very big room, part of which was partitioned off as
a bedroom, while all along one side of the house towards the sea
ran a broad balcony, built out over the rocks, and shaded by tall
thickly-leaved trees, with a glorious view of the blue bay, the open
green sea, and a bit of rose-purple Panay in the distance. I don’t
think I ever saw a more lovely spot, and I could not help reflecting
how different life in the Philippines must be to those who can live in
such places as Nagaba instead of a street in a town. Though, to be
practical, I suppose the food would be even worse, and ice—but one
could not get less ice than we do now in the town.
Some of us spent all the morning loafing about and talking on the
balcony, enjoying the deep shade and the fresh breeze blowing
straight in from the open sea. One of the men of the party had
contrived to catch the anting-anting lizard of the house, such as I
described to you as having a call like a cuckoo and being considered
very lucky by the Filipinos. He had tethered the creature by a piece
of cotton tied round its body, so as to keep it for me to see when I
arrived, and it was much larger than I had expected—about a foot
long—and not unlike the desert lizards one sees dried in the bazaars
in Upper Egypt, only the skin of the “Philippine cuckoo” is all a
pattern of green and red. The poor thing was tame enough, but very
shy, and inclined to get behind furniture or skirts, so when I had had
a good look at it, they let it go again, when it vanished into the thick
fringe of nipa that protected the sides of the balcony. This nipa,
when one sees it close at hand, is a sort of palm leaf folded in two,
lengthways, and tied to frames of bamboo, but it makes very nice,
cool houses, and is absolutely waterproof.
One of the trees that shadowed the house was an Ylang-Ylang,
from which the scent of that name is extracted; a tall, naked, light
brown, smooth stem, with thin branches spreading out at the top,
and leaves like an acacia. The perfume is in the small green
blossom, which is not at all unlike that of a lime, and with infinite
difficulty one or two of these were pulled down by means of a
fishing-rod, and given to me to dry and put in my linen-cupboard in
the native fashion. They dried up in a very few hours, but kept their
delicious scent, and when I came home, I put them amongst my
handkerchiefs, which are sweetly perfumed with them already.

Native Houses.
To face page 204.

Some of the men spent a riotous morning in a fresh-water

swimming bath in a grove near the house. There is a spring of
perfect water, which is brought in pipes past the house and out in
long bamboo pipes on stands in the shallow water, where ships
come and take it in to supply steamers, or to sell over in Iloilo. The
flow of water is very great, enough to supply a city, and the main
pipe is so contrived that by pulling out a plug one fills the swimming
bath, which is a wonderful luxury.
We heard the others splashing and shouting in the swimming bath
all the morning, and when lunch time came, they appeared radiant
and starving, and I have not seen men do such justice to their food
since I came to the Philippines.
After lunch we all settled down in various chosen nooks for a
siesta, and our servant Sotero, who is a native of Nagaba, came and
asked permission to go away for the afternoon, which surprised our
friends very much, for they said they had never heard of a Filipino
servant taking anything but “French leave.”
I have not yet been able to acquire the habit of sleeping in the
middle of the day, which is perhaps one of the reasons why I never
feel well out here. So I sat about, and looked at some picture
papers, and felt very tired—I could cheerfully have gone round to
the sleeping forms and done them some injury simply because they
could sleep!
About four C—— awoke, so we went a little walk amongst the
rocks close to the house, and thought we were exploring the whole
island!
We wandered about amongst scrub and rocks above the shore,
where we came suddenly to a tiny hut perched up amongst big grey
boulders, with fishing nets spread out to dry and a native lounging in
the window-space. It looked such a nice little hut, just one large
palm-thatch room on high poles, with a rickety step-ladder up to the
door, where a round comfortable cat was sitting watching the fowls
pecking about below. A little farther on we came to the banana
patch, with brilliant green plants growing on a nook of dark earth
amongst the grey rocks. All the rocks were very sharp; volcanic, with
rough edges, which cut our shoes, even when we followed a tiny
winding track. After we got to a little height, we could look down on
the village and the sea and bay, which all appeared most bright and
beautiful in the long rays of the low sun, and all so peaceful and
quiet.
We turned back again by a path which struck more inland, past
some more little banana fields and another little hut with its back to
a tiny precipice. It is strange how near the towns the primitive sets
in, for the people in both lots of huts were quite shy of us, and the
children ran away and hid; while in the village, through which we
passed, by making a round across some rice-fields, the people were
quite country-folk, not a bit like the cheeky, independent loungers in
the towns; answering one quite civilly and even happily when one
spoke to them.
The village was delightfully quaint, all built on high poles planted
in the sand of the shore, with many cheerful brown folk hanging out
of the open sides of the houses, while mangy dogs with pups and fat
old sows with immense families sprawled about down below. There
are always quantities of pigs in a Philippine village, for, as I think I
told you, they are the scavengers, and though the natives are not
more unkind to those benefactors than to any other animals, to call
one of them a pig is a frightful insult. In spite of all this, the
favourite and most esteemed Filipino delicacy is sucking-pig, roasted
whole.
Beyond the village we went across a field of emerald grass,
bordered by a deep green hedge of curious bushes with no flowers
on them. Our friends told us that these plants come into bloom in
the wet Monsoon. Now, with the hot weather a very beautiful tree is
in flower everywhere, called the Fire tree, which was only naked
brown branches for a long time, and then burst into huge bunches
of brilliant scarlet blossoms, rather like orchids, and very handsome
at a distance, but coarse and common close at hand. The effect of
these masses of showy red against the vivid green palms is
wonderful and almost too bright. There is one of these Fire trees in
the garden of the house opposite to us, here in Iloilo, which is a
gorgeous display, and a delight to me just to look at as I sit here
writing.
But, to get back to Nagaba, though there is not much to tell you,
except that some of our friends joined us, and we ended our walk by
a stroll through a cocoanut grove, where we saw an old man in a
loin-cloth going up a tree to get the sap from which they make the
tuba.[7] He had a long vessel made of a section of bamboo tied
across his back, and a little round bowl of half a cocoanut tied in
front of his body, with a big sharp knife beside it. He ran up the tree
by means of notches cut all the way up the trunk, and at the top he
tied the vessel under a bunch of buds, putting in it some of the stuff
out of the bowl, which was red bark to dye the drink pink. This
beverage I think I have mentioned to you before. One sees it
anywhere, and the long tumblers of pink liquid are a feature in every
little native shop.
This vessel they leave there for twelve hours, during which the
sap drips out of the palm, and in the morning the man goes up and
takes down the bamboo, now full of tuba, which is very fresh and
nice, and tastes of cocoanut and water, and is very wholesome, not
to say medicinal. If it is left, however, the tuba rapidly ferments, and
by the evening is a very strong intoxicant, which constitutes the
peculiar devil of the Philippines, and is the cause of most of the
deterioration, physical, moral, and mental, of the race.
When the American Army first came out to the Philippines, the
temperance enthusiasts in the U.S.A. hearing that a good deal of
drinking was going on out here, started an agitation, by means of
which they got the Army Canteens in the Philippines abolished. The
result of this drastic mothering was that the soldiers went off and
got tuba, about which, of course, the good folk in America knew
nothing. Frightful scandals happened, which unfortunately did harm
to the American prestige, and even the restoration of the canteens
has not swept away the folly and evil which were thus begun.
 This cocoanut grove, by the way, is kept for tuba, as are most of
the palms one sees near the houses, for when the sap is taken in
this way no fruit appears. Growing cocoanuts is one of the most
lucrative speculations in the Philippines, as a tree bears fruit when it
is six or seven years old, about a hundred nuts a year, the income
yielded by a tree being about 2 pesos. So a grove of ten thousand
trees or so is a very paying concern, if only the planter does not
make the mistake, which I, myself, have often noticed, of placing his
trees too close to one another, so that they do not get enough room
to spread out at the top and find light and air.
We turned back from the cocoanut grove by a different path, and
went back to the house along the beach. As the tide was far out, we
walked across the firm, damp sand, where there were myriads of
tiny crabs of bright metallic blues and reds and greens, which all
darted sideways into holes as soon as one got within a yard of them.
After tea we loafed on the balcony, watching a lovely gold and
rose sunset, while sailors and others took boxes and things down to
the boat; and the man carrying our gear slipped on the rocks, and
our plates and tumblers fell out and smashed to a thousand pieces.
When it was almost dark, we returned in the launch to Iloilo, quite
enchanted with our day at Nagaba and with the house on the rocks.
We are determined to go over there one Saturday to Monday by
ourselves, for it is a delightful change.
 LETTER XXVI.
THE MONSOON—AN ITALIAN OPERA
COMPANY

Iloilo, May 5, 1905.

I had two sweet little love-birds sent me yesterday, sitting jammed
up in a tiny dirty cage in which they had travelled from China. They
looked so uncomfortable and draggled, poor scraps, that I set off
after my siesta, and went “down town,” as the Americans call it, to
see if I could get a cage for them. More Philippine shopping! I
explained and argued at all sorts of emporiums, but no one had
anything the least like a bird cage. At last I thought the wonderful
English store might produce one, and when I got there, they said
they thought they had something of the kind, made of wood, of
native manufacture. I said I thought that would do very well, so
after a lot of rummaging in a camarin, some very nice cages were
found—large and clean, and made of split bamboo, with a little red
and green paint here and there.
 The Track of a Typhoon.
To face page 210.

I was delighted—till I found there was no mistake about their

having been made by a Filipino! No water-pipkin; no tray to slide
out; a door so small that I could only squeeze my hand into the cage
with difficulty; and no perches! It was all there was to be had in
Iloilo, however, so I took it with me, and climbed in under the apron
of the calesa—it was raining very hard—and took my cage home and
told the servants to make perches. This they did with considerable
skill, and the results looked very nice, but when I put the birds on
them, the poor things instantly tumbled off into the soap-dish full of
water, which was meant for them to drink from. After a lot of
anxious thought, it occurred to me that the perches were much
thinner than those in the little cage the birds had arrived in, and
perhaps they could not wrap their long toes round these; and this
was evidently the trouble, for as soon as larger ones were made and
fixed in, the couple got up and stuck on, whispering to each other
how nice the new perches were.
 Of course the cat wants to eat them, and glares with greedy eyes,
while old Tuyay is fearfully puzzled, coming to look intently, and
snuffing very long and hard, which the wee birds don’t mind a bit.
They are such sweet things, with their tiny chirpings and pretty
ways.
There is a strong S.-W. Monsoon blowing now—warm and tiring—
and one’s skin feels sticky and uncomfortable. In a month or two,
however, this will be the chronic condition of the atmosphere, and
will go on till October, but I suppose one gets used to it after a time,
as to everything else. Yesterday a Typhoon was signalled by the
meteorological office, but it has not arrived yet, and I hope it won’t
come our way at all, for the circular winds that sweep over these
islands are the most frightful storms, tearing up trees, whipping off
corrugated roofs, and setting the nipa houses on fire.
There are a great many rats here, which eat up whatever the
cockroaches don’t finish—i.e., whatever is not in glass jars or tins.
They get through nearly as many potatoes—at the price of new
potatoes at home in May—as we do, so I invested in a large wire
trap, which was set in the dispensa ten days or more ago. The boys
and the sota (groom) watched the trap with the keenest interest,
but never a rat would get into it to oblige them. Now, however, while
I was writing this, Domingo came in, beaming, with the trap in his
hand, and a huge grey rat in it. “What are you going to do with it?” I
asked. “Are you going to kill it?”
“Si, señora, by pouring petroleum on the rat and setting it alight.”
He was astonished and obviously disappointed when I peremptorily
forbade this horrible rite, which the Filipinos have learnt from the
Chinese, who think that the poor, agonised, blazing animal runs
away with the ill-luck of the house.
Then he suggested boiling water, and was again disappointed and
surprised when I didn’t join in this spree either, and went off quite
gloomily to carry out my orders—to find something large enough to
stand the trap in so as to drown the poor beast as quickly as
possible.
 Nothing could be found, till the sota fetched a tub from the
stables, and this I made them fill with all the bath water—fresh
water being far too precious to waste, even on sentiments of
humanity! They collected all the water they could, and finally the
flood reached the top of the cage, and though the sight of the rat
struggling made me feel deadly sick, I waited till he was stiff and
cold, as I did not know what cruelty these “little brown brothers”
might not indulge in if left to their own devices.
The cook had been at market, and Sotero had gone shopping, so
there was not the crowd there might have been on the Azotea, and
only half the advice. They don’t get excited, these Filipinos, unless
they are fighting or massacring—one does not see frenzied little
groups shouting in each other’s faces, and throwing their fingers
about like Italians, or low-class Arabs, or people like that—they are
very slow, and their voices always soft and gentle. I mean the
Filipinos, for the Mestizos differ from them in this, as well as in
having curiously harsh, discordant voices, by which one readily
detects their breed.
We went a night or two ago to a performance given by a
wandering Italian Opera Company, who were really very good
indeed, acting remarkably well, and possessing good voices. Three
of them sang in various selections, and the fourth conducted an
orchestra of bare-footed, flat-faced natives in ragged camisas,
whose battered old straw hats hung about the footlight-board and
on the piano.
The conductor played the piano splendidly, with incredible energy
in such heat, and the result that he knocked out of his orchestra was
astonishing. The theatre was very full, and we had shared a box
with some friends, all sitting with our knees jammed together in a
pattern like the ornamentation on a runic cross.
We enjoyed the show immensely, but, oh, it was hot! And if we,
looking on, felt faint with the heat, what must it have been for the
performers and for the Chef d’orchestre! Talking of heat, the
thermometer now averages 90° to 93° all day in the dark, airy
house, and a little while ago, when we got some ice by luck and
manœuvring, I put the thermometer in the ice chest, and it only
went down to 80°!
We have taken the house at Nagaba for next Saturday to Monday,
and are busy making preparations for going over, with an anxious
eye on the sky above and the weather-cock in the garden opposite.
One has to take a good deal to the house at Nagaba, as all they
provide is the four walls, a table, some chairs, a big native bed, and
one or two hard cane couches. For this, however, one pays the same
price a day as at a big London hotel for bed and breakfast for two
people!
 LETTER XXVII.
A WEEK-END AT NAGABA

Iloilo, May 8, 1905.

We were just going to Nagaba when I finished my last letter, I
think, and now we have just returned, after having had a most
delightful time over there.
We went over in the launch on Saturday, leaving here at half-past
four, and to look at the start from here you would have thought we
were going for good to China or Japan!
Before we set out, we sent a boy for a carabao-cart, inside which
the gear was stowed:—two rolls of bedding; some large wooden
cases with household effects; C——’s suit-case with what clothes we
had to take; and Sotero sitting behind, carrying a mysterious bundle,
with the cook beside him, got up in a clean pink and green muslin
camisa and blue cotton trousers, carrying C——’s panama in one
hand, and a long sack full of his beloved pots and pans in the other.
C—— and I and Tuyay followed in the calesa, leaving Domingo in
charge of the house, under oath to mucho quedado (take great
care), but rather gloomy at not being in the outing.
At the Muelle Loney we embarked, with friends waving to us from
the office windows as if we were going away for ever. The day was
perfect and the crossing lovely, but a slight swell made it rather
difficult for us to tranship into the small boat we had towed over.
When we got to the other side, C—— did the complete and efficient
sailorman in stowing the gear in the boat, handing me down
(something after the fashion of the Arabs at Jaffa) into the cook’s
embrace, and giving orders generally; but he spoilt the whole effect
by falling into the boat right on top of me, and bonneting me in my
own topee, at which debâcle the cook showed all his dark red betel-
stained teeth from ear to ear, and even Tuyay laughed.
The tide was very far out, showing long stretches of wet sand and
reefs, all shining in the sunlight, with strips of very blue water in
between. C—— quite redeemed his reputation for sailorising as he
steered the boat ashore by the colour of the water over the sand
banks; and we managed to get not very far from the front of the
house, which we could just manage to make out amongst the trees
and rocks, but the water-pipes on the bamboo frames going out into
the sea, showed us where to look. The crew and the servants waded
ashore, carrying gear, and Tuyay was chucked out and splashed
along with them, while two skinny brown ragamuffins made a “chair”
of their arms, and carried me—with puffings and groanings, so rude!
—to land, and set me down on the beach with a sigh of relief. After
landing me and the ménage, C—— rowed back to the launch to put
the sailors on board, and she steamed away to Iloilo again. Coming
back in the boat alone, he tied her up to a fish corral—a sort of
wattle fence in the shallow water—and then waded ashore and came
gingerly up the sharp rocks.
By the time he arrived I had unpacked, and it was about half-past
five, so we put on bathing suits and filled the swimming bath, and
the fun began at once. It was delicious, after the long, hot day, to
splash about in the cool, fresh water, and we stayed there till it was
quite dark, and we could see stars shining in the patches of dark sky
between the branches. By-the-bye, I often think how strange it
seems to see the same old Orion’s Belt and Cassiopeia looking down
on us here. We see the Southern Cross, too, low on the horizon—a
disappointing exhibition, and no one would think it was meant for a
cross unless they were told so.
We dined early, and were hungry, which was delightful. The cook
and Sotero managed wonderfully, so that we were just as
comfortable as in our own delightful house. There was a firefly
flitting all about the big room, looking so pretty; appearing and
disappearing like a tiny fairy light.
 Next morning, when I woke up, I heard only a few cocks crowing
—nothing to speak of—and some twitterings of birds as well, and I
think the latter pleased me as much as the whole trip! In the
Philippines “the birds have no song and the flowers have no scent,”
they say, which is a sweeping generalisation, but true for the most
part.
We put on our bathing suits, had a cup of tea, and were out on
the beach by six o’clock. The tide was far out again, with long
stretches of shining wet, ribbed sand; the sea all fresh and blue, and
glittering in the sunlight. But where we went was still in shade, for
the sun had not yet come up behind the Guimaras hills, and the
morning air was exquisite. We “ran races in our mirth” along the wet
sands, till we got opposite the fish corral, where the water was
deeper and the boat was tied up to a bamboo pole.
As we went along the beach, we saw people from the little huts
we passed when we were here before, washing at a spring of water
which flowed out from the rocks and down to the beach. They were
some way off, though, and we were in the shade and they were in
the still deeper shade under the cliffs, so we could not make them
out very clearly, but we could see their coppered-coloured skins
shining with water, and hear them laughing and talking.
We swam about the boat for a long time, and found the water
quite warm in the shallows, even before the sun was up. I had
brought C——’s panama, which I hung to the fish corral while I
swam about in the shade, but when we went back to the house, I
had to wear it, as the sun which was then on us is oppressively hot
here as soon as it rises.
The fish corral, by-the-bye, is an ingenious trap, rather after the
fashion of a maze, into which the fish enter but never have the
sense to get out again.
When we got back to the house, we filled the swimming bath,
which felt very cold after the sea, and it certainly washed off the salt
water, but it was nearly as hard and harsh as the sea itself.